Powerbook G4 Hard Disk Problem[?]

Short version: Hard Disk has errors, I erased it, it's still making worrying noises, but otherwise working ok - should I bother getting Applecare involved (yet/at all)?

More detail: My girlfriend's Powerbook G4's Hard Disk has been been making worrying 'clunks' lately, the kind that sound like something is wrong. I backed up all her data, checked the drive with disk utility at first which gave me some errors about the 'b-tree' and it looked a bit dodgy basically. Techtool Deluxe couldn't put it right either (she has Applecare for it).

I ended up erasing (properly, zeroing the drive) and re-installing OS X whereupon disk utility seems to think everything "seems OK" as it usually does, but Techtool Deluxe reported 7 errors when I did a surface scan, and the worrying sound is still occurring. Otherwise it's working ok right now (no b-tree errors etc in OS X), although it's apparently been a little more sluggish lately, since the bad HD sound started.

So should I get it into an Apple authorised repair place pronto, or are they likely to tell me it's fine and there's nothing wrong with it? To me it seems like it's just a case of waiting for it to fail in a more total way, but then it might be out of warranty... (it has about a year on it now). It does seem better since I erased the drive, but the 'clunk' sound is still there, and the surface scan errors TTD reported make me think it might be on its way to the great big HD-cloud in the sky shortly...

So should I get it into an Apple authorised repair place pronto, or are they likely to tell me it's fine and there's nothing wrong with it? To me it seems like it's just a case of waiting for it to fail in a more total way, but then it might be out of warranty... (it has about a year on it now). It does seem better since I erased the drive, but the 'clunk' sound is still there, and the surface scan errors TTD reported make me think it might be on its way to the great big HD-cloud in the sky shortly...

What do people think?

Click to expand...

Past experience with wornties tell me that you should call them imediately, and whenever the HD sounds like it is getting worse. Every call is documented, so if applecare would run out they would have records of you having the problems during the warenty time. With Dell, and Gateway(yes I relize that I am compairing Apple's support to Dell and Gateways) majority of the time if the person reports a issue while under warranty and the issue later makes the product unusable they will send the part out but the person may have to put the product and send the old/non-working part back. Once apple care gets enough of the same complaint from you they will just ask to have it shipped to them to take a look. I had a similar experience with the monitor on my PB.

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